FRANCE.: DEMOCRACY AT RISK 2O17

THE ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF THE DISINTEGRATION OF STATE AND POLITICAL CLASS IN FRANCE

Continuation of the article of 31 October 2015

The weakening of democracy by inadequate government action

Didier BERTIN – 20 December 2015

In our article of 31 October we blamed the inefficiency of the current government in the fight against unemployment and insecurity because of the substance loss of the State particularly with respect to its role as direct actor in the national economy. This inefficiency is especially remarkable given the commitments and the identity of the Socialist Party before 2012 and those of its presidential candidate. The evolution of government policy resulted in the loss of identity of the Socialist Party that supports it, leading to an increasing loss in growth of its electorate.

Before 2012 the right-wing governments were also not efficientbut at least they were leading a policy in line with their identity characterized by the expansion of liberalism and the reduction of social benefits of citizens.

The lack of political courage and boldness led governments since 2012 to apply a rightist policy far from the wishes of the left wing electorate in long run.

The so-called reason of this attitude is the financial and economic policy imposed by European Union "there is no other possible policy", said the French President. This attitude reflects a lack of courage and undervalues the weight of France in the European Union.

Indeed the UK shows now that the policy of European Union can be changed despite the UK has a secondary part in the EU policy as compared to that of France.

Of course the United Kingdom's already accepted wishes will push EU to the right wing in 2016 when we expected an opposite influence of France since 2012.

In developing the theme of competitiveness the UK wants to reduce the social protection of citizens in whole EU and thus the goal of this country which is a kind of commercial company is perfectly in line with the wishes of international corporations.

We again insist that the UK should have been excluded from EU when he did not accept with Poland to apply the Charter of Fundamental Rights.

French governments from the elections of 2012 should have the same audaciousness as that of the UK in order to impose a French wish list to the European Union in particular regarding the social rights of the citizens and the direct role of the state in the economy to fight unemployment.

Today the French Socialist party decided not to play its expected role and to join the right-wing. The rightist policy of the governments before and after 2012 paved the way of the far rightist and populist “Front National.”

The consequence of the union of the socialist party with the right wing is not the disappearance of the concepts of left and right as reported by the media but only the erasing of the left wing.

After the repositioning of the Socialist Party to the right wing far from its traditional electorate which is abandoned, we could fear a risk for the democracy.

There is concern that the National Front rushes to attract a substantial part of this abandoned electorate by becoming a sort of “National Socialist Party” mixing socialism, nationalism and racism as this happened in the past in Germany.

Consequently the abandonment ​​by the Socialist Party and its governments of its initial values may provide troops for fascism.

We do not think that the minor French current Left Front has the competence to take the place left empty by the Socialist Party.

The sole opposition to the Front National is an insufficient identity to attract voters who fear the worst for their future.

We run the risk in the future of a new bipartisanship opposing the National Front to the union of the rightist parties including the socialist party.This new bipartisanship alone involves a significant reduction of democracy and if the National Front wins this could involve the extinction of democracy in France as this happened in Hungary and recently in Poland.